Samsung Smart View
A cohesive product ecosystem in the household
Samsung successfully launched a major redesign of its Tizen TV operating system, Smart Hub. The redesign changes the TV OS home screen from an app-centric to a content-first model. However, within Samsung's product ecosystem, the redesign caused ecosystem inconsistencies, particularly with the Smart View mobile app. Based on our previous work around live streaming and synced and audio/video product concepts, I was asked to start thinking about the product strategy for Smart View. This was an exciting opportunity to explore cross-device interactions across Samsung's home audio and video product lines.
Streaming hours
MAUs
The Smart View mobile app failed to meet the needs of both users and businesses. Before its redesign, the app and the new TV OS was disjointed. There were significant differences in user experience, features, and design systems between the two platforms. Also, customers didn't see much value in the app. This was evident from an annual churn rate of 67%, coupled with unaddressed usability issues related to the key features, such as the remote control and content playback. With the rise of streaming media usage on mobile and internet connected TVs in households, customers expected much more.
To kick off the project, our design team hosted a week-long UX workshop. Design leads for TV, mobile, home audio, and appliances conducted workshops with service business, advanced R&D, and global design teams from Korea. I led a mobile workshop to envision what the Smart View app could be in the next 3-5 years.
After the workshop, we had follow-up sessions with executive leadership to solidify the strategy. The team formed a vision to transform the mobile app into a central hub, making users' life easier and more efficient when interacting with their content and devices.
Next, I started flushing out ideas we prioritized from the workshop around connection, discovery, and control. Based on those themes and workstream, I was responsible for the discovery and created concepts for the app home screen centered around personalization.
"Model 3 seems closer to the TV's layout. I prefer the way the app tiles are fixed at the top for quick access, rather than having to randomly scroll down to find the app row."
I learned we didn’t have the machine learning (ML) infrastructure built to scale for personalized recommendations. Also the ML team was still growing and wasn't ready to tackle this huge ask at this time. Tradeoffs on the “ideal design” vs. what we can actually execute in the timeframes were made.
After narrowing on a design direction based on these constraints, I shared how the designs could evolve. This was to help align our designs to the product roadmap, with the goal of reaching personalized features in a phased and iterative approach.
My Smart View designs influenced two Samsung product lines. Both the TV and Audio teams used the app designs to enhance and manage their content experiences. I worked closely with the Product Design Leads for each product and advocated for a consistent UI framework. I delivered the design foundation for content browsing, search, and device control across Samsung’s Home products.
Now that the design foundation is established, Samsung will continue to iterate and move forward to the next phase:
